


Perfection

by AndreaLyn



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-20
Updated: 2011-06-20
Packaged: 2017-10-20 14:32:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/213775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erik is beginning to lose patience when it comes to Charles' adoration of lesser mutations.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perfection

“It’s groovy.”

Raven’s always been quite vocal about how his technique _lacks_ , but Charles has never had issues with his skills being anything but successful. His fingers trace over a constellation of freckles on a young redheaded woman’s face and he listens to the low-level thoughts that buzz through the bar.

 _\--I wonder if he notices--_   


_\--tonight, I’m going to tell him tonight—_

 _\--what does he think he’s doing?_

Charles strains to find Erik in the din. They’ve come together on this sticky night outside of New Orleans in search of a mutant who has eluded them. It seems they won’t be adding a young Remy to their cause; not today.

The girl blushes and ducks her head down. Charles brightens at the prospect of success lingering within close view. It’s only when she lifts her head to speak that he begins to hear the creaking of glass and wood. Charles dares a look upwards to see that the ceiling above the bar has started to come loose and perilously slant towards the patrons.

Metal screws begin to drop from the sky like rain to the earth. They scatter over the wooden bar. The girl with the freckles lets out a startled cry.

“It’s going to crash!” Someone in the back shouts and all hell breaks loose as the humans begin to panic.

Charles sighs and bids the girl goodbye with a kiss to her palm, releasing it as he walks calmly through the rush of the crowd. He joins Erik, who has been sipping a glass of champagne in a booth near the back. Charles doesn’t dare read his mind, but he doesn’t have to. He sees the glimmer of tension in the whites of his knuckles as he grips his glass tighter than necessary. The drink is an odd choice, as well.

“Are you celebrating?” Charles asks with confusion as people scream and the ceiling comes crashing down to the floor, causing further terror. “Erik,” he chastises. “Someone could have been hurt.”

“No one was,” Erik replies as he lifts a brow. “Your girl is gone.”

Charles slides his finger up to his temple – half frustration, half probing through Erik’s mind – and all he finds when he begins to seek is a wall of displeasure and joy mixing together in Charles’ presence at Erik’s side.

“Let’s go,” Charles says, pressing a hand atop Erik’s in order to rest the glass on the table.

His fingers slip over Erik’s and without intending, he slows the panic of the bar around them. It’s a private moment, of course, but not one that he intended. Erik’s smiles are often rewards in themselves – given so rarely when they’re genuine – but here he smiles at Charles with all the fondness in the world.

“Would you believe me if I told you it was an accident?” Erik asks and the innocence of his expression is an intense dichotomy to the wickedness in his voice.

Charles replies with a dubious expression alone.

“It might well have been.”

“Raven has given me the very same excuse,” Charles says as the movement around them begins to speed up infinitesimally. People move with the slowness of molasses and still Charles’ fingers rest atop Erik’s, brushing with great slowness. “But Raven hasn’t pulled similar stunts at three bars since we began this search.”

Erik says nothing. His demeanor is calm, but he keeps his lips pressed together.

He does twist his fingers upwards, fingertips nudging against Charles’ and prying them away from the stem of the glass.

“You seek out those who have yet to reach the next level of genetic mutation and you try and make them equal to us,” Erik says. The calmness is gone. In its place is a cool anger that always seems to burn beneath Erik’s skin. “You give them standing among us, you elevate the insects to the gods over their _eyes_ and their _hair_ and small _dots_ when you never notice…”

\-- _me_.

Erik’s grip of Charles’ wrist tightens briefly before releasing him. In whole, there is a tightening of Charles’ body that he can blame fully upon Erik. His watch tightens around his wrist, his belt surrounding his waist, and his shoes grow tighter.

“Erik,” Charles gasps.

He closes his eyes and focuses on transmitting one message before Erik’s possessive grip upon Charles grows painful.

 _You’re jealous._

The tightening sharpens with great suddenness and so Charles wastes little time in sending the next message, finger tapping against his temple with a slow shakiness.

 _You have no reason to be_.

Charles can breathe again when Erik releases him and the din around them increases. Everyone resumes as they normally should and Charles reaches a hand out. Erik looks at it, but doesn’t take it. His gaze slides up to Charles’ forearm as though looking for an ink that has never been there – an ink that Erik spends each day worrying _will_ be there if the humans have their way; of all things that Charles has seen in Erik’s mind, this is the image that will never leaves Charles’ attention.

“She had freckles, Charles,” Erik says with great disdain.

“And you brought the ceiling down. This time,” Charles corrects, tiring of waiting. He reaches forward to haul Erik to his feet, releasing his hand as he is greatly aware that calling further attention to them will be _problematic_. “The last bar, you broke the girl’s glass every time she ordered.”

“Accident,” Erik insists. “They used metal bases to their glasses.”

“And the time before that? You locked the girl in the washroom for two hours.”

Erik’s calm expression of reply is infuriating and incriminating at once. “If you are going to insist on coming out to these bars and rendering yourself incapable with drink, then I won’t let you go home with anyone that you’ll regret in the morning.” He remains steady and proud, that strong chin lifted upwards. “I’m doing you a duty, my friend.”

“How I wish that you would do more than that,” Charles says. They keep their distance, but it’s not proximity that Charles has ever needed to reach out and brush against Erik’s mind with suggestion. He has never needed to be close in order to touch his memories, though he has often wanted it.

With a span of space between them, Charles’ message is as clear as ever.

 _Their mutations are flaws._

“And what am I, then?” Erik asks with heavy disdain in his voice. Clearly, he believes that Charles is shameful – that he can’t bear to accept even the slightest of mutation that dotted a pretty girl with freckles or rendered another with different eye colour. Charles feels pity and amusement.

It takes only one word to correct Erik’s misbegotten beliefs:

 _Perfection._

It is all that needs to be said.


End file.
